


And After

by Faint_Harlot



Series: Equilibrium [1]
Category: Naruto
Genre: F/F, F/M, Friendship, Humor, Loss, Love, Post-War, Rebuilding, life - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-03
Updated: 2013-06-03
Packaged: 2017-12-13 19:28:40
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,747
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/827979
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Faint_Harlot/pseuds/Faint_Harlot
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>And I’ll fix you when I have the time – but it may not be ‘til Death’s bell chime;<br/>Give me love and all kind words – don’t leave them for a graveyard rhyme.</i>
</p><p> </p><p>Broken bodies pour in to be fixed by broken hearts. The only way to start over is to speak.</p>
            </blockquote>





	And After

**Author's Note:**

> All works in this series are post Chapter 632 and post-war. Exploring friendship, love, loss, Rookie 9, and rebuilding in the aftermath, as well as forgiving one another. Partial to SasuSaku, Team Seven, and NaruIno, and SasuIno borderline friendship but I don't really know; but other things will be sprinkled in here.

Sasuke thinks flowers are stupid, but he doesn’t know how else to apologize. All he has to give are words, and he doesn’t know many good ones.

She has been quite busy lately, healing every battered lump of flesh that has come knocking at her office door. Hardly leaving anymore, sleep comes only in fitful naps and bloodstained coats – which are irritating anyway, but all the chaos requires it. It is a symbol of hope and order among the rows of bodies, some which hardly draw a breath. 

He slips in at odd times, working around his daily schedule of interrogations, written confessions, and regularly occurring nightmares. Laundry proves to be a frustrating task for him, and death is preferable to asking for help, _not that Naruto would know how to, anyway._

“I could just do it for you, you know,” Ino sighs, arms folded. Body leaning against the door frame to hold herself up for this bleary 2 a.m. chore. She is exhausted as the rest of them, but she’s never been one to refuse Sasuke. Especially in his pitiful, albeit humorous, attempt at trying to fix things. 

Sasuke makes a pained face: Whether it is at the suggestion or the blood running down the drain in washed-out rivulets, she is not sure. 

He mutters something along the lines of “Least I can do.”

“I tried to get her to slow down, but she’s stubborn as always,” Ino drawls. “I don’t know the last time she’s been home.” 

Accusing silence.

“She won’t listen to me,” the blond adds. Stifles a yawn. “What’s your next plan?” Even Ino has come to interpret the fascinating gradient of silences of which Uchiha Sasuke is capable. “Is apologizing out of the question, or …?”

His response is an irritated grunt; white coats tumble from the high dryer and onto Sasuke’s head. Stomping, he quickly gathers them into his arms and tosses them in the basket with an accompanying glare at their audacity.

A beat, and his anger fades. Ino hates how pathetically lost he is.

“C’mon, let’s soften her up with some flowers. It’s the best place to start.”

 

 

When he slips through the door without a sound, he realizes Ino was right.

She’s fallen asleep on a mess of paperwork and a scalpel with a thick coat of dried blood. Head on her arm, fingers dangling over the front of the desk, loosely curled. Nail beds harboring the deep reds and purples of a hundred and one procedures, not all of which were successful.

He sees cards and flowers from others; shoving them aside, he places the vase carefully at the corner of the desk. Drops the immaculately-folded stack of coats and clothes with a quiet _foomph_ onto a chair, and stands in front of the desk, watching her back slowly rise and fall.

_Stubborn._

Without a sound, he places his hand underneath her bangs, on her forehead. _Warm. Too warm._

He could wake her up, but he has the feeling the conversation would play out as it had the past few days. Refusal, cloying, “Don’t worry, I’m fine.” She is done acquiescing to suggestions; she’s not a little girl anymore. 

He thinks she wants to fix the world. He knows that’s likely his fault; he’s the one she can’t put back together. 

Leaning over the desk, fingers splayed across paper. Letters brimming with strong words . . . thankful, accusing, technical, or full of grief. Embedded with attributed meaning, they build up and tear down with precision. Needless to say, he is not well-versed with emotional words; and lately, that’s all his life has been. Stories, actions archived into documents chronicling his messy life. Marking people, motives, and death. Weaving a legacy that none of his peers will escape.

Nor her.

Taking in her tired eyes, worn knuckles, the beginnings of a fever she will refuse to acknowledge, he stupidly mumbles, “Sorry.”

The back of his neck prickles as if shadows will strike, as if what he says is forbidden. Now that he has opened his mouth, it won’t stop, _stupid._

“Sorry,” he inhales, leaning and pressing his mouth against her hair. He tries to stop, but his lips keep moving: “Sorry . . . sorry . . .” 

There’s no better way to articulate this, and maybe it is better she’s asleep. He’s furious, searing heat dashing across his neck, cheeks. _Stop talking, idiot._

His fingers find her coat, twist themselves in anger. He’s pathetic and he knows it, that he has to do this while she’s unconscious. She will never hear it. Quiet syllables hiss, lingering in the still air, a confessional whisper. 

For once, he’s lost and cracked open with no solace.

 

 

“Why didn’t you make her go home, Ino!?”

“Keep your voice down, idiot; and you really think I can tell her what to do? Geez, first Sasuke, then you—”

Ino waits for Naruto to recite his customary curses and grumbles. 

“He’s still being a big jerk to her—”

“My point is, maybe you guys should just let her do what she needs to do, and then prop her up when she needs it, because that’s what she’s always done for both of you!”

There’s a sore point, a snap in her voice that cannot be argued with. Maybe a touch of guilt. Too late have they finally rekindled a childhood relationship. There’s a lot they have to fix. And too late she has finally been thrown into the dysfunctional dynamic under which Team Seven operates. 

Naruto is too busy pouting; Ino throws her arm abruptly and it knocks the wind out of him.

“ _Oomph!_ Man, having you around means being hurt twice as much—”

“Do you hear something?”

They fall silent (well, save Naruto’s complaining) and Ino grabs the back of his jacket before he can rush headlong into Sakura’s dark office.

“Just – stay – still!”

They poke their heads around the door frame and Ino preemptively puts a hand over his mouth before he can yell at Sasuke and ask him _just what the hell are you doing you-!_ He speaks into her hand, slobbering on her palm in anger, or jealousy, she guesses. There’s always jealousy.

Ino drags him down the hall as quickly as possible.

“I want to spy as much as you do,” she hisses, “but you’re too damn loud! Now we have to deal with his sullen temper!” Frowning at him, she continues to drag him away. “And yours, too.” 

 

 

She notices the flowers first. They’re cut with frightening precision; and she cannot deny that they brighten up the sullen office. Gently fingering the petals of a daffodil, her eyes sweep the room. “Oh!”

Sitting still as stone, his elbows are on his knees. Occupies a chair in silence, like a statue.

“How long have you been here?”

As usual, there’s no answer. “Do you need something, Sasuke-kun?”

She continues bustling around, organizing paperwork. He slowly rises from the chair and heads for the door. 

“Wait, who brought me these?” she asks. Something in her voice suggests she already knows the answer. “And who cleaned those?” 

Confusion is written all over her face, so he offers an imperceptible shrug. “You’re busy. You should take better care of yourself.”

She bristles a little at his callousness; after all, the wings are full of the dead and dying. Despite herself, a small smile winds its way onto her face. “Well, thank you.”

Turning back, he frowns. Her bright eyes widen as he places his hand on her forehead.

Without another word, he turns to leave again. Before he can, she wraps her arms around him and exhales, “It’s okay, you know.”

Neither move.

Tentatively, he returns the hug. Just this once. “Hm?”

“I’m not that fragile,” she scolds, squeezing him tighter. “And I heard.”

He doesn’t grace her with an answer, ever stubborn, ever rude. It is only in another instance of certain death that he would begin to admit his stupid, rambling apology. Maybe.  
“I’m just glad you’re alive,” she sighs into his collarbone. “There’s too many bodies as it is.” 

This fact is uncomfortable to him, and acutely. There’s something about her profession that makes him nervous; she does not have to be doing this. She does not have to take responsibility for Death, but with everything he had seen since his return, she was likely the only one of them who could. Naruto bullies it into submission; he dances across the line every time he needs to feel alive. 

“Anyway, your apology is accept—”

She is interrupted by a click and flash coming from the door: In the light, two pairs of bright blue eyes shine brilliantly. One with mischievousness, the other reflecting anger. 

“You _jerk_ —”

“Haha, this is golden!”

“Ino-pig!”

“…” _Great._

“You come back and just think you can hug my Sakura-chan all the time?”

“I’m making so many copies of this!”

“I’m not yours, Naruto, I don’t belong to you!"

“ …” _Listening to Ino was a stupid idea._

“Augh, you still have your hands on her, jerk!”

“I said to apologize, not hook up—”

“Excuse me, we’re not—”

“ . . . _Your_ Sakura?”

Sasuke actually speaking leaves everybody struck dumb. In the resulting lull, Sasuke hastily snatches the camera from Ino’s hands and stalks out with Naruto furiously snapping at his heels. 

Sakura turns away from Ino, quickly shaking out a white coat and throwing it around her shoulders. At the same time, they turn to stare at the vase of flowers on the desk. 

Raising their gazes to one another, Ino grins cheekily and earns a giggle in response. A blush fumes in her friend’s cheeks, and she snorts, “Your hair is too pink for you to blush, forehead.”

Ino earns a white coat tossed at her face; it smells of soap, fresh and untouched by blood.

As the intercom beeps, frantic calls for the head medic on duty echo hollowly across the hospital. 

They rush out the door, neither eager to greet the waves of broken bodies. Sprinting past the boys (who have one another by the collars) with grim determination, stern expressions ready to greet Death. 

When this is over, maybe they will finally have time. All of them. Time to sit and talk, squabble and tease, and talk about things long pushed away. Frivolous things, laundry and paperwork, strong liquor and love. 

And maybe, they will have time to piece everything back together, glue their foundations so tightly until they are unbreakable. The fragments of love, loss, time and war. 

It begins with an apology.


End file.
